While I can’t abide the feeling of lipstick on my mouth, I admit I am dangerously drawn to mascara.

Given a bit of time, my taste in make-up would run to ridiculously overdone catlike flick-up eyeliner, eyeshadow rising halfway up my forehead and sooty false lashes.

In reality, I do this so rarely that I have no skill, subtlety or even much symmetry, and people rear away in slight alarm at the sight of me. The effect is rather like, as someone once said of Dame Barbara Cartland, ‘two crows who have crashed into a cliff-face’.

Considering my ineptitude with a mascara wand, it’s not surprising that, most of the time, I barely wear any make-up.

When moments or meetings occur that require a slight mask, it’s mascara, possibly eyeshadow if I can find it, powder but rarely foundation, never lipstick. A quick smile at the mirror helps, and off we go. Even in my 20s I rarely went further.

I have long been reconciled to being outside the herd in this regard, but interestingly, it turns out that I am not the only mature woman who is ditching the blusher brush. One poll has found that 20 per cent of older women rarely or never wear make-up.

Actress Sheila Hancock, 83, said that she no longer bothers with make-up onscreen or off, preferring to look ‘real’.

Dame Helen Mirren, at 71, keeps it natural when not on the red carpet, and last week said it would be ‘wonderful’ if more women did the same.

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It’s not just older women. This week, ITV breakfast presenter Susanna Reid posted striking selfies on Instagram with and without make-up.

And who can forget the sight of Hillary Clinton, 69, in her first post-election appearance without a scrap of make-up? After all the blow-dries and the careful preening, it was refreshing to see the exhaustion of her marathon campaign etched on her face.

Having frankly admitted to wanting ‘never to leave the house again’, she turned up looking — by TV standards — startlingly rough.

But by normal standards, Hillary just looked like any quite tired woman in her 70th year, getting on with her life and work.

Some saw her action as a deliberate swipe at the artificiality and pizzazz of the previous months. But maybe she was just being herself. Like any of us on a busy day, she was not bothering with make-up because it can be a bit of a tyranny.

Wash your face, slap on a bit of moisturiser and out you go. Sorted! It certainly saves time: imagine how much faster women could have advanced in the world without having to spend all those hours staring into mirrors.

Dame Helen Mirren, at 71, keeps it natural when not on the red carpet, and last week said it would be ‘wonderful’ if more women did the same (pictured with and without make-up)

If, as the surveys suggest, more and more women are adopting this approach, it may not be just for speed.

In a world where commercial pressures urge everyone to hide behind the full Max Factor, stepping out bare-faced might become a statement of real strength — especially if you’re middle-aged.

So why not forget all that primping and powdering? Declare that as far as looks go, at least, you’re at ease with yourself and can live without the slap.

Some celebrities, one suspects, are doing it quite deliberately, defiantly. We have lately glimpsed the real faces of Sharon Stone, Brooke Shields, Glenn Close and Faye Dunaway.

It’s almost as if they were demonstrating how skilful a mask they usually wear for pictures and performances: ‘Look, we can do magic, but underneath the glitter we’re just human.’ Thus, they win both ways.

Revealing their faces stripped bare takes nothing away from their mystique. Instead, it rather adds to it. For there can be real power in refusing such artifice.

I was struck by this recently when I saw the remarkable actress Harriet Walter on stage, unmade-up, her chiselled face like an Aztec carving, playing Shakespeare’s great male roles; Henry IV, Brutus and Prospero rose before us, hypnotic with the force of personality and sincerity.

NOW MEET THE WOMEN WHO'VE TURNED THEIR BACK ON MAKE-UP

Paula Atherill, 40, runs a digital marketing business. She has been a youth worker in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, for 15 years.

For me, being able to go out bare-faced and ditch the mask shows confidence. It’s a positive choice.

I used to wear make-up every day, spending 20 minutes or so applying the full works from foundation to eye liner, eye shadow, mascara and lipstick.

Paula Atherill , 40, runs a digital marketing business. She has been a youth worker in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, for 15 years (with and without make-up)

But working with young girls and seeing just how much make-up they put on saddened me. It made me question why we feel a need to wear cosmetics.

For impressionable teenagers, a full face of make-up seems to go along with wearing next to nothing and a loss of self-esteem. Young girls are perceived in a certain light because of the way they look.

It made me think I should set an example by going make-up free. I felt vulnerable and exposed at first so there was a transition, but after two or three months it started to feel normal.

Now I only wear make-up for special occasions. I concentrate on living well rather than covering up the wear and tear with beauty products.

Laura White, 33, is a full-time mother of four and lives in Durham.

Make-up ages the skin as far as I’m concerned. My mum, who hardly ever wears any cosmetics, is nearly 65 and hasn’t one wrinkle.

The same went for my grandmother. When she died at 93, she had beautiful skin, so I’ve decided to follow suit and ditch the foundation.

Laura White, 33, is a full-time mother of four and lives in Durham (with and without make-up)

I have a good complexion and look much better with my freckles showing. When I see the sort of make-up that’s fashionable these days, I think it looks horrible. Women must spend so much time applying it every day. I’d rather spend my time doing something more interesting. I’m not a shy or self-conscious person, so I was happy to go bare-faced. I haven’t had any negative comments.

Perhaps my lips and lashes look better with a little make-up, but apart from that, I don’t miss it or the faff of having to put on a mask every time I go out.

Frauke Golding, 54, runs online retailer Hampshire Furniture. She lives in Hampshire with her husband Adrian, 58, a company director, and has three stepchildren.

Ditching make-up has been a gradual process dating back to my late 20s. My mother was constantly telling me off for wearing too much as a teenager, which, of course, I ignored.

It wasn’t until I was nearly 30 that I realised she might have been right.

Frauke Golding, 54, runs online retailer Hampshire Furniture. She lives in Hampshire with her husband Adrian, 58, a company director, and has three stepchildren

I remember I needed a passport replaced urgently and had a photo taken without my customary full face. Someone who saw it commented on how fresh-faced and natural I looked.

After that, I wore less and less make-up until two years ago I stopped altogether after buying a lipstick, putting it on and feeling completely artificial. I’m completely confident without make-up, even though I’m older.

When I finally got married to Adrian two years ago in St Lucia — we’d been together for a decade — I was the only woman at the ceremony not wearing make-up. It was the same when we went to Ascot for the racing.

Even when I was given an award for exceptional services to finance at the Houses of Parliament, I went bare-faced.

Rather than feel underdone, I think I look better for it. The money I save on cosmetics I now spend on expensive moisturisers from Clarins. My skin has never been clearer and people often comment on how youthful I look.

I’m convinced that wearing too much make-up is bad for your skin. The less I wear make-up, the more I notice it on other women. I’m amazed at the amount some people wear.

Rather than make-up covering up the years, I think it exacerbates the look of wrinkles. I’ll never go back to cosmetics.

Interviews and additional reporting: ZOE BRENNAN

To primp such power up with coloured creams and dusts would have been almost blasphemous.

This is all very well for the rich and famous, I can hear you saying. But what about the rest of us plain Janes who don’t have endless facials and treatments to give Mother Nature a helping hand?

It’s true that actresses tend to have pretty good features and fine eyes. And, yes, without make-up some of us perhaps look more like undefined potatoes.

But, hey, potatoes have their own beauty and too much make-up can be even more unflattering than an exposed face. For example, the most unnerving thing that happens when you go on TV — even on the most informal daytime chat show — is when they sit you down in make-up, sadly explain that High Definition TV requires special treatment and take out a sort of electric spray.

Ordering you to shut your eyes, they do a full heavy mask of pigment until your whole face is bland beige, with no shape or shadows. Then they start painting.

The message is a disconcerting one: it says that your actual face is simply not good enough for the Alan Titchmarsh show. So they need to create another one. At times like this I thank heaven that I largely work on radio.

Even men get it trowelled on for the pitiless bright camera lights, though mercifully for them in real life, of course, their image-making is allowed to stop at the tie, except perhaps for a quick slick of hair gel.

Those males who do go in for everyday maquillage are regarded with grave suspicion. Indeed, plenty of his colleagues started losing faith in Tony Blair when he took to keeping his bronzing make-up and more on all evening after doing TV. I ran into him one time and the effect was startling. It was like meeting a tangerine in false eyelashes. Normally, men get the beige layer scrubbed off embarrassedly as they leave TV studios.

But we women, on the other hand, are still urged to improve ourselves with powder and paint, even if we’re not on screen or posing for selfies, but just getting on with doing a good job in a professional world.

95 per cent of women keep their make-up habits a secret from their partner. A third sleep in their make-up twice weekly

If I was in a corporate job where such nonsense was talked, I would last about 20 minutes before taking to the barricades. Yet it happens: Mary Beard, professor of Classics at Cambridge University, is perhaps the most notorious example of a woman who has been damned for ‘not making an effort’ for going on TV without make-up.

The late TV critic A. A. Gill said she should be ‘kept away from the cameras altogether’.

She graciously forgave him, which goes to prove her the better person

Today, she says: ‘I am buried in the library trying to finish writing an academic article. I’m not wearing make-up, and the debate seems a pretty clear one.

‘Face painting can be celebratory, joyous, expressive and fun, and it’s a pity men don’t get such a chance very often, poor things.

‘But when it’s about pressure, about conforming to a particular model or about concealment, then it’s a terrible ball and chain.’ So it is good news that this sentiment isn’t just restricted to older women like Mary and me.

Young women are increasingly repelled by the notion that they need a full face to be taken seriously — and have adopted make-up as the next feminist frontier.

Last year it was high heels, when receptionist Nicola Thorp started a campaign after she was sent home from work for daring to wear flats. Before that, it was bras. So could 2017 be the year the sisterhood showily burns their mascara?

It could well be. There are more than 12.8 million ‘#nomakeup’ posts on Instagram, typically accompanied by a bare-faced selfie — though how many of those are actually from women stealthily boasting about how good they look without make-up we cannot know.

What is pretty obvious is that some of them are modelling a maidenly ‘barely there’ look, which in reality takes as much time and effort as the full Joan Collins.

One beauty writer explained recently that producing a glowing, natural girlishness required foundation, concealer, two shades of contour powder and translucent overpowder, highlighter, blusher, three shades of eyeshadow, mascara, eyebrow pencil and wax. Oh, and lipstick. With, of course, lipliner. Personally, I’m not burning my mascara or eyeshadow. Because it can be fun, even for idlers like me, to work on your ‘look’.

And for some, it is a performance art, donated to the rest of us to marvel at or laugh at. Some women go through all their lives adoring make-up, and good luck to them. We all have our foibles.

Cosmetics shouldn’t be compulsory, or expected or made a condition by men (File photo)

Who knows? I might take to it one day. When it doesn’t feel like a smear of engine oil on your mouth.

The only really depressing thought is that while us old troupers can take it or leave it, make-up is being sold strongly to the very young.

Natasha Devon, the mental health and body image campaigner, says she sees children as young as 13 who are dependent on make-up, complaining they look ‘weird’ without it. Not just larking around with Mum’s lipstick as we all did, but feeling anxious without it.

‘If you wear it every day and get used to seeing yourself with it on, your real face becomes unacceptable to you and this can lead to self-esteem issues,’ says Devon. ‘Filters and photoshopping of selfies only magnifies this problem.’

So applaud all women, old and young, potato-faces or goddesses, who demonstrate that ditching the permanent discipline of make-up is absolutely fine: liberated, cheerful and time-saving.

Cosmetics shouldn’t be compulsory, or expected or made a condition by men. Or, indeed, by other women friends — another survey said that most women claim they don’t wear it for men’s sake at all.

The older a human being gets, and the more battles we win with and without paint, the more character our faces develop. And the more right we all have to go through the world in naked dignity, if we feel like it.

Going without make-up in middle age is not a sign of giving up: it can even be an act of reclamation. ‘Here I am. Like it or not. It’s the face I live in.’

So whenever employers or men wanting a trophy Barbie doll on their arm start to expect cosmetics as a duty, we should reflect rebelliously on the other dictionary meaning of the words. ‘Make up: to complete, to make amends, to compensate for a deficiency’.

I don’t want to go all bra-burning here, but when make-up is made compulsory, there’s a sense that women in their natural state aren’t quite complete. Unfinished. Slightly deficient versions of men, requiring a bit of paint to make them acceptable. Creepy, really.

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More and more women are ditching cosmetics but would YOU dare join them?